Race and Diversity in Japanese Studies Symposium Program Now Live

The Japanese Studies Centre is hosting a postgraduate symposium to be held at Monash University. This symposium centres on the theme of ‘Race and Diversity in Japan and Japanese Studies’—a theme that reflects the diversity of research topics in the discipline of Japanese Studies, while also highlighting the growing diversity of junior scholars conducting interdisciplinary research on Japan. Today, postgraduate students come from many parts of the world and from many different ethnic backgrounds, religious affiliations and gender/sexual orientations. The theme of this conference poses important questions, such as: What does it mean to conduct research that moves beyond the normative structures of Anglo-Australian, Anglo-American, Japanese-migrant or other frames of reference that have traditionally dominated Japanese Studies?

Keynote Speaker Professor Marvin Sterling (Indiana University) will discuss his experience as an Afro-Caribbean anthropologist researching Japan, reflecting on the extant disciplinary divides historically and currently present in scholarship of the African and Asian diasporas. Sterling’s book Babylon East (Duke University Press, 2010) has been widely acclaimed as an exemplary critical analysis of race in Japan.

Professor Marvin D. Sterling, Indiana University

This event is open to the public; if you would like to attend the symposium, please RSVP here (or cut and paste https://goo.gl/forms/uMAelgCAtvywgu1h2 into your browserThis event has been generously funded by the Japanese Studies Association of Australia Small Grants Scheme and the School of Languages, Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics Research Committee (Monash University).

The symposium has been made possible by generous funding from the Monash University Faculty of Arts School of Languages, Literatures, Cultures and Linguistics as well as the Japanese Studies Association of Australia.

To download a PDF copy of the program with full abstracts, click here.